Under Siege 2: Dark Territory
| starring = | music = Basil Poledouris | cinematography = Robbie Greenberg | editing = Michael Tronick | studio = Regency Enterprises | distributor = Warner Bros. | released = | runtime = 100 minutes | country = United States | language = English | budget = $60 millionMarylynn Uricchio, P.,Film Critic. (1995, May 16). Box-office bonanzas or bombs? Pittsburgh Post - Gazette Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.sl.nsw.gov.au/docview/391879774?accountid=13902 | gross = $104,324,083 }} Under Siege 2: Dark Territory is a 1995 American action film set on board a train traveling through the Rocky Mountains from Denver to Los Angeles. Directed by Geoff Murphy, it stars Steven Seagal as the ex-Navy SEAL, Casey Ryback, and is the sequel to the 1992 film Under Siege also starring Seagal. The title refers to the railroading term that the subject train was travelling through dark territory, a section of railroad track that has no train signals and in which communications between train dispatchers and the railroad engineers were impossible. The film was produced by Seagal along with Arnon Milchan and Steve Perry. The film's cast also included Eric Bogosian, Everett McGill, Morris Chestnut, Peter Greene, Kurtwood Smith and Katherine Heigl. Nick Mancuso, Andy Romano, and Dale Dye also reprised their roles from the first film. Plot Casey Ryback retires from the United States Navy and has settled in Denver, Colorado, owning and running a restaurant named Mile High Cafe, where he is also an executive chef. Sometime after, his estranged brother, James Ryback, dies in a plane crash. Casey meets James' daughter, Sarah, whom he will accompany to Los Angeles to attend his funeral. The two board the Grand Continental, a train traveling from Denver to Los Angeles through the Rocky Mountains. Onboard, they befriend a porter named Bobby Zachs as well as the train's chefs. As the train makes its approach to the Rocky Mountains, it is hijacked by armed mercenaries, led by former U.S. government computer hacker and computer genius Travis Dane with his right-hand man and mercenary leader Marcus Penn. Dane worked on Grazer One, a top-secret military satellite particle weapon designed to destroy underground targets. The military fired Dane due to his mental instability; Dane later faked his suicide. The mercenaries take the train's passengers and staff hostage, herding them into the last two cars. Casey kills one mercenary, then slips away. Among the hostages are two former US Department of Defense colleagues who worked with Dane. Dane threatens them with torture unless they reveal the codes to take over Grazer. Despite giving up the codes, they are thrown from the train into a deep valley. During the course of events, Zachs becomes Casey's sidekick. Middle Eastern terrorists have offered Dane $1 billion to destroy the Eastern seaboard by using Grazer to target a nuclear reactor located underneath the Pentagon. Dane demonstrates Grazer to investors by destroying a Chinese chemical weapons plant. After one investor offers an additional $100 million, Dane destroys an airliner carrying the investor's ex-wife. The U.S. government has difficulty locating Dane or Grazer. When officials destroy what they think is Grazer, Dane explains the NSA's premier intelligence satellite was destroyed instead. As long as the train keeps moving, his location cannot be determined. However, Casey faxes a message to his assistant manager at the Mile High Cafe, who contacts Admiral Bates. Bates reluctantly approves a stealth bomber strike to destroy the train. Zachs discovers that they are on the wrong tracks and on a collision course with a Southern Pacific freight train hauling gasoline tank cars. Since the trains are in dark territory, it was impossible for the train dispatchers to communicate with the trains' engineers to stop the trains to avoid collision. Dane and Penn plan to abandon most of the mercenaries to certain death with the hostages by leaving via helicopter with some of their elite members. Casey kills the mercenaries one by one and releases the hostages by uncoupling the last two cars, but Dane uses his computer skills to locate the stealth bombers and re-targets Grazer to knock them out before they can complete their mission. Meanwhile, Penn had previously captured Sarah and uses her as bait for Casey. Casey confronts Penn and breaks his neck after a fight that spills into the kitchen. Casey finds Dane about to depart in a chopper hovering over the train. When Dane informs Casey that there is no way to stop Grazer from destroying Washington, Casey shoots him. The bullet destroys Dane's computer, cellphone and injures Dane. Pentagon control of the satellite is restored and it is destroyed by remote control one second before it would have fired on the Pentagon. The Grand Continental and freight train collide on a trestle. Casey races through the exploding train and grabs a rope ladder dangling from the chopper. Dane, who had survived Casey's bullet, also catches on to the ladder. He attempts to climb into the helicopter, but falls to his death into the explosion when Casey shuts the helicopter door on his hands, severing his fingers. The explosion causes the helicopter to spin out of control, but the pilot is able to regain control. The only survivors of the incident being Casey, his niece Sarah, the porter Zachs, and the mercenary helicopter pilot (who Zachs has at gunpoint). Casey, having previously detached the last two cars from the rest of the train, informs the Pentagon that the passengers are safe. Later, Sarah and Casey pay their last respects at James' grave. Cast * Steven Seagal as Lieutenant Casey Ryback, a former Navy SEAL who now heads and manages a restaurant in Denver * Eric Bogosian as Travis Dane, a crazed computer genius-turned-cyberterrorist leader who designed the Grazer One satellite weapon for the US government before being fired for his mental instability * Everett McGill as Marcus Penn, the mercenary leader & Dane’s right-hand man who leads a team of terrorists to hijack the Grand Continental train to set up the satellite equipment * Katherine Heigl as Sarah Ryback, Ryback's niece who accompanies him on the train to go to her father's funeral * Morris Chestnut as Bobby Zachs, an eager porter of the train who reluctantly helps Ryback with the hijacked train * Nick Mancuso as Tom Breaker, the shady CIA director who assists ATAC on Grazer One * Brenda Bakke as Captain Linda Gilder, a member of ATAC and one of Dane's former colleagues * Peter Greene as Mercenary #1, Penn’s main mercenary who was once instructed by Casey Ryback at Fort Bragg * Patrick Kilpatrick as Mercenary #2, One of Penn's mercenaries * Scott Sowers as Mercenary #3, One of Penn's mercenaries * Afifi Alaouie as Penn's sole female mercenary * Andy Romano as Admiral Bates, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff * Dale Dye as Captain Garza, Admiral Bates' right-hand man * Kurtwood Smith as Major General Stanley Cooper, an Air Force general who commands ATAC and Dane's former boss * Sandra Taylor as Kelly, a barmaid on board the train * Jonathan Banks as Scotty, the mercenary driver under the orders of Penn to drive the locomotive of the Grand Continental train * Royce D. Applegate as Ryback's cook who runs the restaurant when Ryback is absent * Dale Payne as Train Conductor Production Development The film was an early credit for Matt Reeves who wrote the script with a friend of his in college. Reeves later said, "There was a big action spec market, a lot of movies that were selling, and so we wrote this movie with my thought being, ‘And then I will be able to finance my student film and that way I can become a director’." The script was called Dark Territory at one stage and End of the Line at another. When they finished writing it "the spec market crashed and it didn’t sell." But the script was optioned and eventually Warner Brothers optioned it and decided to turn the film into a sequel to Under Siege. Reeves said the film was originally "meant to be very much like a Die Hard movie, which I guess Under Siege really was too, except the difference was that in the Under Siege movies that tension is how soon before Segal will rip out someone’s larynx. And what I love about Die Hard was this idea of the underdog, that here’s this guy, especially in that first movie, who’s a cop from New York who doesn’t even have shoes. And somehow he has got to save this building, save the day. That was what that movie was suppose to be, but it didn’t end up being that." Casting Jenny McCarthy unsuccessfully auditioned for a role in the film. She said Segal auditioned her and asked her to take off her clothes. Shooting According to Morris Chestnut Seagal rewrote many of the scenes he was in. "The only time that really stuck to the script or had ad libs was the stuff when he really wasn’t there. It was a lot of stuff, because at that time I think he was flying a helicopter, he was doing something... He would come to set, “Okay, you’re gonna say this. I’m gonna say this and this is gonna happen and then you do that.” That’s how we did a lot of that movie." Katherine Heigl later said that on the last day of filming Seagal told her, "'You know Katie, I got girlfriends your age.' And I said, 'Isn't that illegal?' And he said, 'They don't seem to mind'." Part of the film was shot in Chatsworth's Stony Point Park. The production painted some of the boulders, which upset rock climbers who claimed it made them unsafe.Riccardi, N. (1995, Apr 07). Rock climbers see red when film crew paints boulders outdoors: Movie company covers over graffiti-and tiny ledges and wrinkles-at two spots in a chatsworth park. climbers blame city for allowing it. Los Angeles Times (Pre-1997 Fulltext) Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.sl.nsw.gov.au/docview/293182019?accountid=13902 Director Geoff Murphy called making the film "a very dreary process and very highly contentious at the time - lots of arguments and stuff. There was a point during the editing where I observed this incredibly high energy beast emerging, and I didn't know where it had come from, because there wasn't any of that energy on the set. It seemed to grow out of the editing process." Reception Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a three-star rating in his review, while Peter Rainer of The Los Angeles Times wrote that "the action upstaged the actors." Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 37% based on reviews from 30 critics. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale. Box office Under Siege 2 opened at #2 at the box office under Apollo 13 in 2,150 theaters and made $12,624,402 for the weekend. Sequel On October 3, 2016, Seagal announced on his official Twitter account that the script for Under Siege 3 was in development. References External links * * * * *Review of film at Variety Category:1995 films Category:1990s action thriller films Category:American action thriller films Category:American films Category:American sequel films Category:Films about hijackings Category:Films about terrorism Category:Regency Enterprises films Category:English-language films Category:Film scores by Basil Poledouris Category:Films directed by Geoff Murphy Category:Films set on trains Category:Films set in Colorado Category:1990s action films Category:Siege films